Revision as of 00:57, 15 April 2007

Littered throughout much of the Year Zero information discovered thus far, sequences of numbers have been found. All the numbers so far have been in the format "24.x.y", where "x" has up to this point been a number between 1 and 20, and "y" a number between 1 and 8.
While several theories have been posited as to their significance, no definite conclusion on their meaning has been reached.

24.10.7

24.10.8

24.11.1

24.11.3

24.12.2

Found through the phone number 18664456580, which is on the back of Year Zero packaging. In the transcript of the message it is implied that this number refers to the disclosure of surveillance, a statute of the United States Surveillance Law.

24.13.1

24.13.2

Found on a flyer (http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=399108993&size=l) handed out at a show in Paris, France on February 21, 2007. Under the right side of the horizontal part of the T, there are a bunch of horizontal lines running down alongside it. If you count, there are 24 horizontal lines, then a vertical line, then 13 horizontal lines, then another vertical line, and finally 2 more horizontal lines. This gives 24.13.2.

>>>>It has come to the attention of the Bureau of Morality's Internet Monitoring Taskforce that several of the clients for whom you handle IT seem to show bandwidth loads that do not match their formally submitted audit numbers.

We have asked for clarification of this matter on three occasions. Your replies have been either evasive or insufficient or simply late. Frankly, speaking as one human being to another, it has been as bad as dealing with a health insurance company.

>You may be aware of that frustration yourself, in the lengthy delays you have encountered trying to process the papers for your wife's breast cancer treatments. So I know you understand our frustration, and will be motivated to do your very best to explain these bandwidth discrepancies.

>>>>>>>>>You may submit any information in the full confidence that it will remain anonymous.

24.20.1

24.20.2

24.20.3

24.20.4

Found on the Art Is Resistance flier that gave the location of the billboard.

The Theories

Pilgrim Streams

With the premature discovery of Free Rebel Art and Exterminal, a new theory has surfaced relating to the cryptic numbers. The following text was on freerebelart:

Pilgrim Stream: 24.2
Data in transit -

This brings up the notion that the Pilgrims separated the content they wished to send back into "streams" for categorization, and their machine farm is sending them back in no particular order, or in an order for which the meaning has yet to be revealed.

This is currently the most likely theory.

Dates

One initial theory was that the numbers corresponded to dates; for example: 24.14.2 would translate to the 14th of February, 2024. However, this theory was quickly seen to be flawed; "Year Zero" itself has been determined to be 2022, and the frequency of the second and third numbers make the date theory unlikely. Also, efforts to link the numbers to the emerging Year Zero Timeline have proven fruitless.

A second theory was developed by some who suspected a Biblical connection; in the King James Bible, the 24th book is the book of Jeremiah. Many reading it felt that it offered a fitting undertone to the overall Year Zero story.

For example: 24.14.2 would translate as book 24 (Jeremiah), chapter 14, verse 2.

So far, there have been no numbers that do not match up with bible verses; however, many numbers interpreted in this way do not seem to give any special insight.

Year Zero Tracklisting

One widely researched theory is that the numbers correspond to letters from the Year Zero song titles. The logic behind this is that the first number, 24, refers to Halo 24, the designation of Year Zero in the NIN catalog; the following numbers refer to a track number and a letter in the title of that track. For example: 24.14.2 would translate as: Halo 24 (Year Zero), song 14 (Another Version of the Truth), character 2 (n). In this theory, it has never been determined exactly what the purpose of the numbers would be. However, with the discovery of numbers which had a second value higher than 16, some doubt was cast on the validity of this theory. Because Year Zero only has 16 known tracks, one would have to then discount several well-established numbers.

The letters which, using this theory, have been referenced are:

h-sur-ves-m-th-godgiven-m-h-th-ano-in-zero

Federal Orderly Conduct Act

The number 24.13.1, found in the warning for accessing the Art Is Resistance website, is a section from the Federal Orderly Conduct Act which the user violates by visiting the page without proper authorization. This suggests that each of the found numbers correspond to a section of the Act. Also, 24.12.2 was found through a phone number found on Year Zero packaging, and is said to be a statute in the Disclosure of Surveillance section of the US Surveillance Laws.

This theory will be impossible to confirm, however, unless a copy of the Act is released.

Halos

Some theorists suspect that the second section of each number refers to the Halo number of previous NIN releases, with the third part of the number indicating a track. In this theory, the 24 at the beginning of the number serves only to link them all together as part of the world of Year Zero, which is, as stated above, Halo 24.

Some of the tracks referred to in this theory:

Halo 1. Down In It

Down In It (Skin)

Halo 3. Head Like a Hole

Head Like A Hole (Slate)

Head Like a Hole (Clay)

Terrible Lie (Sympathetic Mix)

Halo 5. Broken

Pinion

Wish

Last

Halo 8. The Downward Spiral

Mr. Self Destruct

Halo 9. Closer To God

Closer To God

Closed (precursor)

Halo 10. Further Down The Spiral

Piggy (Nothing Can Stop Me Now)

The Art Of Self Destruction, Part One

Self Destruction, Part Two

The Downward Spiral (The Bottom)

Hurt (Quiet)

Eraser (Denial, Realization)

At The Heart Of It All

Eraser (Polite)

Halo 11. The Perfect Drug

The Perfect Drug (Remixed by Meat Beat Manifesto)

Halo 12. Closure

Piggy

Halo 13. The Day the World Went Away

Day the World Went Away

Starfuckers, Inc.

Halo 14. The Fragile

Somewhat Damaged

The Day The World Went Away

The Frail

Halo 15. We're in This Together, Pt. 1

We're In This Together

10 Miles High

Halo 16. Things Falling Apart

Slipping Away

The Great Collapse

The Wretched (version)

Starfuckers Inc. (version)

Halo 17. And All That Could Have Been

Terrible Lie

Halo 18. The Hand That Feeds

The Hand That Feeds

Halo 19. With Teeth

All The Love In The World

You Know What You Are?

Halo 20. Only

Only

The Hand That Feeds (DFA Mix)

Love Is Not Enough (Live At Rehearsals)

Only (Video) (??)

Supporters of this theory point to the following excerpt from the chat at the solutionsbackwardsinitiative website as suggesting there is a link between the materials with numbers on them and the music of NIN:

MIGUEL: What's our key text?
EVA: don't get me started.
. . .
JORDAN: We mined a few banned books/songs.
WAYNE: Eva didn't like my choice.
. . .
MIGUEL: Banned books? Oh, THAT was a good idea.
. . .
EVA: at least i used music from someone who's alive and fucking kicking.
MIGUEL: Was alive when he went to prison. Who knows now.

Catalog of Clues

Some suggest that the numbers are used simply as a way to catalog the clues to the World of Year Zero as they are found, either by the real-world World of Year Zero followers or by the in-game Solutions Backwards Initiative team. Evidence for this is that many numbers with the same second value are found through similar means; for example, all the numbers beginning with 24.16.y were found as a result of the Survivalism video.